Coaching Changes Have Begun in College Football

The regular season has come to an end for college football which means it’s time for the yearly coaching shakeup around the country. Teams that underachieved now begin to clean house, fire their coach and look for a new start.

Let’s take a look at some of the biggest changes up to this point.

Texas Tech Cleans House

Texas Tech University fired its head coach, Kliff Kingsburg, after a 5-7 record and no bowl bid. Red Raider fans saw it as a long time coming and were calling for his job for weeks.

Kingsburg’s five-year tenure will be remembered with high-flying offenses and weak defenses. In 2018, Kingsburg and his team entered November with a 5-3 record but will leave it with five straight losses and no head coach.

Breaking: Texas Tech has fired coach Kliff Kingsbury after the Red Raiders finished with a third consecutive losing season, a source confirmed to ESPN. pic.twitter.com/XT6utDeFpx

— ESPN College Football (@ESPNCFB) November 25, 2018

Kingsbury left Lubbock, Texas, never having won more than eight games in a single season. Expectations were high when he replaced Tommy Tuberville in 2013, but the firing marked the end of his era. He ended his term with a 35-40 record and just one bowl win.

Kansas Opts for Miles

Kansas fired its head coach, David Beaty, after four lackluster years.

Beaty finished his time with the Jayhawks with a 6-42 record and won just two conference games in four years. His one signature win was an overtime win over Texas in 2016. But the win was part of a 2-10 season.

Beaty promised improvement every year he was at the helm, but after a 3-9 record in 2018 and a disappointing recruiting class, the Kansas front office removed him.

In his place, Kansas hired Les Miles. Miles spent the last two years in the broadcast booth after being fired from LSU after a 2-2 start and a 114-34 record in his 12 years with the team. Fans rejoiced at the return of his hard-nosed, tough coaching style that kept LSU in contention most of his tenure.

Miles signed a five-year contract that will pay him $2,775,000 annually with retention bonuses of $775,000 due in November 2020 and $500,000 in November 2022. The 65-year-old coach was named the day that Beaty was fired as a candidate for the Kansas job. He was hired just two weeks after the firing of Beaty.

Mack Brown Back in Chapel Hill

North Carolina fired Larry Fedora after back-to-back disappointing seasons where UNC won just five games total. Fedora’s teams dramatically declined after the departure of quarterback Mitchell Trubisky in 2016. In the following two seasons, the team went 2-9 in 2017 and 2-9 in 2018, resulting in Fedora’s removal.

In his place, North Carolina will return Mack Brown.

BREAKING NEWS: #UNC has its next football coach. It’s Mack Brown, sources confirm. STORY: https://t.co/egJq2bYAFV pic.twitter.com/1159QyK8Ia

— InsideCarolina (@InsideCarolina) November 26, 2018

Brown had three 10-win seasons in his last coaching span with the Tar Heels from 1988 to 1997. He then took a job at Texas, where he spent 16 years. Brown finished with a 69–46–1 at UNC and has a 244–122–1 overall.

Louisville Fires Petrino

Bobby Petrino was released after a 2-8 2018 season with Louisville. The Cardinals regressed significantly after the exodus of quarterback Lamar Jackson. After a disappointing season, and a recruiting class ranked 80th in the country according to 247.com, Petrino was fired Nov. 11. He finished with a 77-35 record during his two separate times at Louisville.

A few names have come up to replace Petrino, but the current front-runner currently seems to be Jeff Brohm.

Brohm took over an eight-win Western Kentucky in 2014 and maintained that level of wins during that first season. He then won 12 games in 2015 and 11 in 2016. Brohm then took over as the head coach at Purdue, where he totaled a 13-12 record, including a big 49-20 win over then-No. 2 Ohio State in 2018.